


in dreams

by youwerefantasticrose



Category: Rogue One: A Star Wars Story (2016)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-02-23
Updated: 2017-02-23
Packaged: 2018-09-26 12:26:51
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9896456
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/youwerefantasticrose/pseuds/youwerefantasticrose
Summary: Cassian's had the dreams as long as he can remember. But never with Jyn there.Post Rogue One, everyone's alive AU.





	

“Cassian.”

They’re flying to the Corellian system, a recruiting mission, several days into the journey. K2 and Cassian are up front, flying, Jyn somewhere in the back. Cassian blinks heavily at K’s voice, but doesn’t shift from facing forward, looking out into space, his hands loosely on the controls. He’s gotten good at tuning K out, especially when he knows he’s going to say something he doesn’t want to hear.

“Cassian,” K says, louder this time.

“What?” he snaps, sharper than he intends.

“You’ve been awake for 51 hours now.”

“And?”

“And humans tend to need a few hours of rest every few days,” K2 says dryly.

“I’m fine,” Cassian grumbles.

“I’m sure you are, but I’d prefer for us not to crash.”

“We’re in outer space,” Cassian says, finally looking over at K2. “What could we possibly hit?”

K2 doesn’t say anything, just tilts his head to the side like he does when he knows he’s won.

“Fine,” Cassian sighs. “I’ll take a break. Wake me in an hour.”

K2 nods, taking over the controls, but Cassian knows he won’t. They’re still a day away from their destination, and he really does need the sleep. They’ve been on mission after mission since they recovered from Scarif, weeks of hospital beds and bacta tanks and tune-ups for K. They’ve had a decent success rate, so they keep them together, the three of them constantly holed up in their tiny ship. He hasn’t yet decided if the close quarters are a blessing or a curse.

He heads towards the back of the ship, nodding in greeting to Jyn. She’s sitting on one of the bunks, holding the mission packet, but he knows she’s already read it a hundred times. She’s just avoiding K2, who’ll either put her to work or talk her to death if she rides next to him.

Cassian huffs out a laugh as he sits down, picturing her reaction to either scenario.

“Don’t tell him,” she says, and he looks up at her. She’s smiling softly, and he returns it, one corner of his mouth lifting. They read each other easily now - more easily than they talk. There’s much more said with a raised eyebrow or a lifted shoulder. Words are unnecessary. Or maybe they’re just too hard for them. They fight together, fly together, would die together (and almost did), but there’s no discussion and never will be, he thinks, of what they are, what they could be.

“I won’t,” he says, laying down, staring up at the top of the bunk above him, “if you make sure he doesn’t let me sleep too long.”

“Of course. I’m not sure I trust him to fly anyway.”

He chuckles, closing his eyes. He falls asleep almost instantly, a trick he picked up in his early days of the Rebellion. He can run on a few hours of sleep, and rest almost anytime, anywhere. A necessary skill.

But there’s always the dreams.

He can’t remember when they started. It almost feels like he’s always had them, but he knows that’s not true.

They shift, faces and places, but they’re all the same. Lives he’s taken, images he can’t forget. The pull of the trigger, the smell of burnt flesh, the tightness of his throat as his mind tells him ‘this is right, this is necessary’ and his body revolts, his stomach roiling and his eyes burning.

The latest is Tivik, the informant from Kafrene. It plays over and over. “I’ll never climb out of here!” “Hey, calm down, calm down.” Cassian puts his arm around him, false comfort, and then he does it, and Tivik’s dead.

In reality, Cassian looked at him for a moment and then moved on, looking for his escape route and climbing up, the voices and the footsteps of the storm troopers echoing beneath him.

But in his dreams, he can’t move. He’s stuck on the spot, staring at Tivik’s body, his face, his lifeless eyes. Taunting him. The shame fills him, cold, and he’s frozen. The stormtroopers get louder and louder and they surround him, and all he can think over and over is: how is he different? Don’t they think too what they do is for the greater good?

This point is always the same. He stands unmoving, his hands shaking, the voices and the crowd around him drowning everything out, the sound unbearable until he wakes up, panting, sweating, not sure if where he wakes is any better.

But this time, just as his vision becomes all white armor and dust, everything stops. It’s silent. It’s so opposite from the norm that he’s confused. He looks around, and there she is.

Jyn stands at the opening of the alley, just inside, one hand on the wall. She looks at him, her face impassive, and looks down at the body. The stormtroopers are gone - it’s just the three of them now: Cassian, Jyn, and Tivik.

Her eyes move up to his, and he looks away, the shame turning white hot. He can’t bear for her to see this, to see what he’s done, who he really is. His eyes turn to his boots, scuffed, dirt-smeared, a single drop of blood on one.

He catches a scent, blaster fire and earth and something sweet, almost flowery, and a hand takes his. He looks up and she’s next to him, their fingers lacing.

It takes him a moment to meet her eyes, afraid of what he’ll see there, pity or disgust. But when he does, all he sees is understanding. She knows him, knows this, and she understands.

They stay like that, unmoving again, but it’s different. He’s no longer stuck, free to move, but he doesn’t want to, doesn’t need to. When their eye contact breaks, he turns his head. The body’s gone.

The ground shifts and she squeezes his hand in hers, and then he’s awake.

He’s bleary eyed and it takes a minute for him to adjust, remember where he is. He’s in his bunk, the top dark above him, fingers wrapped in his.

His head whips up as he realizes she’s really there. She’s on the floor by his bunk, facing him, her legs stretched out in front of her. Her head’s leaned towards him, resting on the edge of his bunk, their hands joined at his waist, her arm resting next to his legs. Her eyes are closed, her breathing heavy. Her scent surrounds him, and he breathes deeply.

He doesn’t know what happened, if he made some sound or jerked in his sleep, what made her come over and take his hand. But he lays his head back down, eyes roaming her face, softer in sleep, wisps of hair falling on her cheeks, and he’s grateful.

Without thinking, he squeezes her fingers in his, immediately regretting it, worried that she’ll wake up and retreat, having said too much without saying anything.

But she squeezes back, a corner of her mouth quirking up in her sleep.

He watches her, still, silent, and then his eyes close and he sleeps, dreamless.


End file.
